


Collateral Damage

by kangeiko



Category: Alias
Genre: Gen, Hallucinations, Season 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-07-25
Updated: 2005-07-25
Packaged: 2017-10-07 18:16:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/67849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kangeiko/pseuds/kangeiko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being Sydney Bristow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Collateral Damage

  
Sydney Bristow is in her kitchen and she is slicing meat with swift, sure strokes. She adds paprika, cayenne pepper and just a pinch of oregano, and rubs the mix into the naked pink flesh and pearlescent fat. The raw meat is slick beneath her fingers.

She is in her kitchen (//_déjà vu_//) and she is sipping wine and laughing, and the meat looks good enough to eat raw. She reaches out a hand, half-joking, and then she is slapping the reaching hand away and scolding, _Jesus, Syd, how about a little patience? This is gonna be the best stew ever, I promise._

She is across the room, where she is perched on the counter and recounting the tale of the hapless Japanese client and the prim and proper English guide. She is looking down at the meat in her hands and slicing open a secret pocket to stuff it full of peppercorns and lemon rind. _Cayenne pepper and lemon rind is unusual,_ Sydney says.

_It's a secret family recipe; I'd tell you the rest but I'd have to kill you,_ she replies.

She adds the pink pieces of meat – slick and slippery in her hands as she drinks her wine and twirls a pen and fetches a CD from the living room and is behind her desk at work and is watching McCullough through the glass and is kissing Will/Vaughn/Charlie – and her hands are spattered with hot olive oil (_extra virgin, Syd; any dish can be brightened up with a dash of extra virgin_).

Across the room, her hands pantomime the elaborate dance of body language crossing cultures: forward / back ; too far away / too close; too cold / too friendly. _It was the funniest thing, Francie,_ she says, and takes a sip of her wine.

At the frying pan, she covers the crackling heat and starts on the rice. _We're out of rice, so I'm gonna have to improvise._ Sydney says, and carefully cleans her long nails before reaching for a vegetable knife. _Do you trust me?_

_Of course,_ Syd says, and smoothes her short blonde hair back with a gloved hand. In the corner, Will is playing with the paring knife between his fifth and sixth intercostals.

Sydney is watching herself slice up her fingers in lieu of rice. _Anyway, the whole thing sounds bizarre, Syd; you meet the strangest people._ She adds the fingers, piece by piece, to the crackling stew.

(Stew shouldn't crackle, Syd thinks, and almost wakes up.)

Across the room, Sydney looks concerned. _You're running out,_ she says. _Let me help you with that._

She slides the knife free from in between Will's ribs. He looks surprised.

_You'll love this,_ she says. _I call it my Julia stew._

(She grinds the bones up in the blender.)

*

fin


End file.
